New EPA rule could lead to rolling blackouts

New EPA rule could lead to rolling blackouts in Texas, PUC chairwoman says

Jack Z. Smith
Fort Worth Star-Telegram
Friday, Aug. 19, 2011

The head of the Texas Public Utility Commission expressed concern Friday that a new federal air quality rule, set to take effect Jan. 1, will cause disruptions in electric service.

If implementation of the Cross-State Air Pollution Rule is not delayed, "I have no doubt in my mind that this rule will result in reliability issues and rolling outages in Texas," Donna Nelson said at the start of the commission's meeting.

The rule, issued in early July by the Environmental Protection Agency, would require substantial reductions in emissions of nitrogen oxides and sulfur dioxide at power plants in 27 states.

The EPA says the rule will save and prolong lives by reducing harmful smog and soot pollution. Gina McCarthy, an EPA assistant administrator, said in a previous statement that power plants in the state "will be able to cut their pollution without jeopardizing reliable electricity service for Texans."

But Dallas-based power generator Luminant says it doesn't have enough time to comply and has asked that the EPA delay implementation.

The company says the industry's standard time frame for installing emission controls is several years, but the rule requires compliance in six months. So Luminant, a subsidiary of Energy Future Holdings, has said it may have to shut down some coal-fired power plants in East Texas.

"Curtailing plant and/or mine operations will be the only option" if the 1,323-page rule goes into effect as planned, Luminant said.

In an Aug. 4 letter to the EPA, Nelson said that the new rule is "overly burdensome" and that the federal agency "has ignored the effects of local transmission constraints when considering the impact of generating-plant retirements on electric reliability." Nelson became the PUC's chairwoman after former Commissioner Barry Smitherman was appointed to the Texas Railroad Commission last month.

PUC Commissioner Kenneth Anderson said Friday that the tight implementation schedule for the rule "will be impossible to meet" and urged that the state agency "file comments with the EPA asking them to, at the very least, extend the compliance deadline."

For the short term, Texas' power grid continues to be taxed by exceptionally high temperatures that have led to record-high electricity demand this summer, the PUC was told Friday by Mike Cleary, senior vice president and chief operating officer for the Electric Reliability Council of Texas.

Cleary said power supplies could be tight next week with schools reopening and adding about 1,500 megawatts of additional demand.

ERCOT set an electricity demand record of 68,294 megawatts on Aug. 3.

Oncor rate hike

In other action Friday, the PUC approved a rate increase for Oncor Electric Delivery, the chief electric transmission and distribution company serving North Texas.

A portion of the increase took effect July 1. When fully implemented Jan. 1, it's expected to raise the electric bill of a typical residential customer by about $1.60 per month.

The increase will boost Oncor's annual revenue an estimated $136.7 million, far less than the $350 million increase the company was seeking when it filed its request in January.

The settlement was supported by Oncor and interveners in the rate case, including the Steering Committee of Cities Served by Oncor, a group that includes Fort Worth, Arlington and other Tarrant County cities.

This is some serious shit here. Oh, I'm sure it's not to those not living in Texas... until it happens in their state.

More on this below.... with relevant links providing facts to go along with it.

How Obama Spent His Summer Vacation- Day One: Kill Power Plants, Kill Jobs

John Ransom
Townhall Finance
August 20, 2011

Prepare for your electric rates to go up, Chevy Jolt drivers.

Under new interpretations of old rules, the EPA will shortly be forcing the shutdown of about 20 percent of coal-generated electric capacity in the United States. Since coal generates about half the electricity demanded in the US, the country will have to find other, more expensive ways of making up about ten percent of electric capacity at a time that the administration wants electric to be the clean fuel of choice.

Maybe Obama doesn’t understand that he can’t import electricity from Brazil.

In addition to the loss of generating capacity, the Commerce Department estimates that the new rules could kill up to 60,000 jobs, says Heritage, while an industry trade group says that the rules will cost $129 billion, according to the Washington Post.

During the 2008 presidential campaign then-Senators Barack Obama and Joe Biden both claimed that if elected they would institute policies that make it cost prohibitive for coal-fired plants to operate in the United States.

Looks like this is one promise they’ll keep.

“So, if somebody wants to build a coal plant, they can,” Obama told the San Francisco Chronicle in a clip the paper likely tried to suppress, “it’s just that it will bankrupt them, because they are going to be charged a huge sum for all that greenhouse gas that’s being emitted.”

“Senator Obama,” said Carey in November 2008, “has revealed himself to be nothing more than a short- sighted, inexperienced politician willing to say anything to get a vote. But today, the nation's coal industry and those who support it have a better understanding of his true mission, to 'bankrupt' our industry, put tens of thousands out of work and cause unprecedented increases in electricity prices.”

The administration is using new interpretations of long-ago passed emission standards- standards that no administration has tried to enforce- along with vague, esoteric “visibility” standards to target older, coal-fired plants. Critics say that the EPA fails to make a case that the plants present a danger to public health or visibility, as the EPA seemed to admit when they issued a stay against adoption of the rules earlier this year.

“The stringency and cost of the new regulations provoked an outpouring of protest and some 5,800 comments” writes Heritage, “citing technical and statutory errors. Some 21 governors and more than 100 Members of Congress also raised objections. Ultimately, EPA officials were forced to acknowledge their failure to ‘calculate standards that fully reflected operational reality.’”

But as Obama tries to shore up his base of support amid blistering criticism from progressive groups, look for Obama to continue to use backdoor regulatory means to enforce, ignore or otherwise interpret laws to benefit special interests that support the president’s agenda.

Earlier this year Obama scrapped Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, instructed the Justice Department to ignore enforcement of the Defense of Marriage Act and just this week announced that the administration would be suspending deportation of illegal aliens in an effort to avoid enforcement of immigration laws.

Obama has been subject to criticism from Hispanic leaders, who are still stuck on the Democrat plantation, after the administration bragged that they deported more illegal immigrants than the Bush administration.

In addition, the president has issued more job-killing regulations than any of his predecessors- at least 75 of them through mid-year 2011, at a cost of $38 billion just for adoption. Total economic costs of federal regulations are sky-rocketing to $1.75 trillion says the federal government’s own Small Business Administration.

In short, the coal group got it right in November 2008.

President Obama has revealed himself to be nothing more than a short- sighted, inexperienced politician willing to do anything, saying anything and pay anything to get a vote.

Even while on vacation, day one.